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Families, staff speak out over concerns of possible Cave Creek Unified school closures

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CAVE CREEK, AZ — In a community forum on Monday night, parents, students, and staff of two different elementary schools in Cave Creek expressed their concerns over the possible closure of their schools.

The Cave Creek Unified School District and its board are looking at possibly closing Lone Mountain Elementary and Desert Sun Academy. This was a recommendation by a focus group tasked with figuring out what could be done about the continued declining enrollment in the district.

According to a presentation to the school board in December, enrollment for the district decreased by more than 800 students in 10 years in the smaller school district.

“We’re graduating 400 seniors and we’re only bringing in 200-220 kindergartners. There’s declining enrollment, which means declining funds,” said Superintendent Bill Dolezal. “As you know, we’re funded based on student enrollment, so when enrollment goes down, the money goes down."

Dolezal said capacity at all five elementary schools is currently at 47%.

“With budgetary constraints, and decreasing population, it really is looking at becoming more efficient in order to serve our students,” Dolezal said.

Cave Creek Unified joined several other districts in the past year going this same route. In December, the Roosevelt School District board voted to close down five of its schools amid a budget deficit. The Kyrene School District is in the middle of forming a committee to look at “long-range” planning with enrollment continuing to decline. The Peoria Unified school board just voted to go down the route of looking into proposals and possible solutions to the same problem. Paradise Valley Unified closed down three schools at the end of the last school year.

There are multiple factors as to why enrollment is declining: the birth rate continues to decline, there are more school choices now from charter and private to universal Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, and a lack of affordable housing for new families in some areas. Some districts are in areas where they cannot grow and bring in new families, like Mesa Public Schools, which is looking at laying off some staff for the next school year due to declining enrollment.

In Cave Creek, the possible closure of those two schools would impact more than 600 students.

“This proposal needs to be rejected so that there's more time to make the best decisions for students,” two students of Lone Mountain Elementary told the school board in the forum Monday night.

Desert Sun Academy parent Marla Riney told ABC15 she’s not surprised with the closure recommendation of her child’s school.

“It is a very sad time for any district to have to close schools but having been involved with the district actively for both bonds and overrides, those have failed. As well as many other conversations, this is a realistic need for our community, sadly,” she said.

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However, some other parents feel like they’re getting the short end of the stick. The proposal says Desert Sun Academy students would be moved to one school – Horseshoe Trails Elementary - while Lone Mountain Elementary students would be split into two schools, Black Mountain Elementary and Desert Willow Elementary. The plan would also move sixth graders from elementary schools into middle schools.

“All of our kids, family members are going to be divided amongst the other schools. That part of it has really been hard,” said Natalie May, a second-grade teacher at Lone Mountain Elementary.

Several parents and educators spoke out in the meeting, proposing a solution: combine both Desert Sun Academy and Lone Mountain Elementary.

“I don’t think they want to close schools, but in their eyes, it's the best thing to do. I think we need more time to come up with another solution,” said Chris Herrera, a parent at Lone Mountain Elementary.

“I know it's emotional. It should be, but what I know in the community, the strength of this community, it's always been the people that live in it and we're going to need that strength now more than ever,” Dolezal said.

If the schools close, the plans are still unclear for staff. However, Dolezal mentioned that they hope to find positions for their teachers based on their human resources attrition estimates.

The school board has the last say in the matter and will potentially vote on the recommendations on Tuesday, January 28.